Shifters

Chapter 12

LUKE

The security guard behind me shoved me into my room and I stumbled, tripping over the corner of my bed. I fell and lay sprawled on the carpet. The guard chuckled cruelly and I jumped up, not even sure what I was planning to do, just that I was going to hurt him. I was going to avenge Will's death, starting with the guard. But the door slammed in my face and the click of the lock echoed around the room. I leaned my forehead against the wood and took a deep breath, trying to calm my anger.

You can't help Will now, I told myself. He's gone. Anything you do is just going to get yourself hurt or killed. Thea's only got you left. Unless you count those new kids and from the looks of it, theyre right on track to get themselves killed along with me.

My train of thought was suddenly knocked off the rails by a loud beeping. I pulled my guide rock out of my pocket to find it flashing. REPORT TO MEETING ROOM IMMEDIATELY blinked across its surface. I backed away from the door and tried opening it. Still locked.

Idiots. I held my guide rock up to the door. "Sorry. I can't go to your meeting. Somebody locked me in my room," I told the rock sarcastically. It beeped twice and the lock clicked. "Nevermind," I muttered.

The corridors were, as usual, deserted. The only sounds were my footsteps and a quiet hum coming from my guide rock as it meandered across the white-tiled floor. When we reached the meeting room door, it stopped. I picked it up and continued inside.

The meeting room looked pretty normal, with a rectangular table with seven seats. Well, there weren't any other doors that might lead to even more labs where they could inject us with even more chemicals and even more of us could die and-

"Hi Luke."

I jumped at the sound of Thea's voice. She was sitting in the furthest corner of the room. I went to go sit next to her and realized that her eyes were red from crying. I probably looked like that and worse.

Ivy and James arrived a few minutes later and took the seats across from us. James's ears were bright red, but I didn't ask. I didn't really care. Last to arrive were Dr. Edmont and a girl I didn't recognize with cat ears and mismatched eyes. Edmont took the chair at the head of the table. Cat-girl slid in next to Ivy.

A fresh wave of pain seared through me when I realized that the empty chair next to mine would have been Will's. What were they trying to do, leaving the chair like that? Threaten us? Provoke us?

Edmont pulled a remote out of the pocket of his lab coat and pushed a button. A hologram popped up on the table in front of us. The figures on it were...

Us? The words "Mission TGSD" circled around the edge of the table like a fence keeping the holograms of us trapped inside.

"Now, let us begin," Edmont said cheerfully. "Welcome to Mission Total Government ShutDown."